After a trip to the chiropractor to make sure my back was on point after sudden stiffness and pain after deadlifting, it turned out my shooting hip pain and sciatica was being caused by piriformis syndrome.

Piriformi-whatnow?

What’s a piriformis?

To quote spine-health.com, “The piriformis muscle is a small muscle located deep in the buttock (behind the gluteus maximus).”

When it gets tight, injured or otherwise compressed, it sends pain through the hip and lower back, complete with tingling down the affected leg.

I tried squatting with piriformis syndrome still in full effect.

I wouldn’t recommend it.

Injuries suck: squats and deadlifts dropped like a stone in the weeks post-ass strain.

How do you rehab a tight piriformis?

Some say rest, others say move.

Here’s my list

Foam roll. A lot. I used a baseball to really get into the muscle and fuck me, it was horrendous. But effective.

Rest. A little. Get back to movement and body weight movements asap to keep range of motion fluid.

Most of all, keep doing the work you can do that doesn’t cause pain. Cardio, stretching and getting back to hip-dominant movements as soon as feels comfortable are what worked for me.

How I became a tight ass

Following an unsuccessful attempt to crack the 5 plate deadlift (though I’m coming for that mofo again soon) I went into a cycle of deficit deadlifts.

Deficit deadlifts are performed on a 2-3 inch board to force greater engagement of the glutes and hams. They’re used to help build strength in the initial lift-off and aid lifters who struggle to break the bar from the floor if that’s the weakest part of their lift.

These were going well and in the same week I pulled 2 reps of 180kg on deficit deadlifts, two days earlier I squatted 140 for reps.

In hindsight I was overworked and not dedicating on recovery and mobility enough. Warm-ups were minimal and stretching was rarely thorough.

What did I learn?

When it’s time to take a deload week and you’ve already skipped the last 2 deload weeks, it’s time to deload.

Mobility is a buzzword but it’s still underrated. Stretch, roll and do whatever feels good to loosen up. That includes massage (find somewhere good, reputable and not renowned for other more personal services).

Deficit deadlifts are fantastic for anyone who is struggling with breaking the bar off the floor. Run them for 1-2 cycles of 531 in place of regular deadlifts.

]]>https://dadlifts.wordpress.com/2016/09/23/piriformis-syndrome-rehabbing-a-real-pain-in-the-ass/feed/0img_2681-1anapestictendenciesTraining Programme: The Guest Principalhttps://dadlifts.wordpress.com/2015/11/03/training-programme-the-guest-principal/
https://dadlifts.wordpress.com/2015/11/03/training-programme-the-guest-principal/#commentsTue, 03 Nov 2015 20:01:38 +0000http://dadlifts.wordpress.com/?p=34]]>My current routine is brutal. Savage, even. It was inspired by Jim Wendler’s Boring But Big challenge published on T-Nation and it’s a 3-day full-body workout with a focus on getting bigger & stronger.

Before We Get Started

Buy the 531 book. Please support the guy who designed 531, only for doughnuts like me to ruin it with our own interpretations. If you want to learn 531, buy the book and do 531. Don’t do this routine.

What is The Guest Principal?

Based loosely on Wendler’s Boring but Big, this program is designed for those who have a 3-day training week and hate spreading cycles over more than a 7 day period.

It’s also fucking hard going.

The main lifts are fine. It’s the accessory work (the 5×10 sets) that’ll sap the energy out of you.

I’ve named it The Guest Principal. Jim Wendler will probably think I’m a dick for the name and the programming. I’d be inclined to agree with him.

How Does it Work?

First you need to know your 1 rep maximum lift for the following exercises:

Squat

Deadlift

Bench press

Overhead press

From there, you’ll calculate 90% of your 1 rep maximum and use that to plan out your lifts for each session.

So for example, if your 1RM squat is 110kg, you’d use 99kg (or 100kg for simplicity’s sake) for programming your squats.

Your percentages would then look like this:

40% of 100kg = 40kg

50% of 100kg = 50kg

60% of 100kg = …you get the idea

Setup & Structure

Using the same percentage cycles to periodise the weight as 531, the end of each 4 week cycle sees your lifts go up by 2kg on bench and overhead press, and 5kg on squat and deadlift.

But here’s the kicker that I’ve carried over from Boring But Big: your 5×10 increases every 4 weeks too: you start month 1 at 50% of your 1RM, and Month 3 sees you at 70% of your 1RM.

However, you can drop the 70% in Month 3 back down to 60% if required.

After month 3, you should stick at 60% 1RM, mimicking Wendler’s approach in the core Boring But Big plan.

See the 531 Periodisation Guide below for how to structure your 531 lifts.

And please. Please read Jim’s explanation of 531 here and buy his book here before trying this.

Week 4 also sees the 5×10 decreased to 3×10. You’ll appreciate this in weeks 8 and 12.

A snapshot of deadlifts during week 2 using the 531 percentages, followed by 5 X 10 reps at 50% of my 1 rep max.

Tips

Don’t eat too much before training. By the 4th set of 5×10 squats or deads, you’ll be fighting to hang on to your dinner

Don’t add more volume. I can’t stress that enough. Week 1 will be a piece of piss. Week 7 will have you on your knees. Week 11 will feel like the apocalypse has arrived.

If you’re on a cut (in a caloric deficit) drop the secondary assistance work to 3 x 10, e.g. On squat 531 day, bench press would be 3 x 10.

You can also decrease the 5×10 volume in month 3 to 5×5 (unless you can handle that volume & weight. I burned out doing 5×10 at 70% 1RM)

Use the Big Lifts 2 app (iOS here, Android here) to track your progress using the Boring But Big template. It takes the work out of calculating your lifts

Calories & Diet

Training day = 3600

Rest day = 2400

Increasing calories on training days and decreasing on rest days, I usually consume around 2,000 calories post-training. I train between 7:30 to 8:30 pm so eat relatively little during the day, with lunch and evening meals coming in at around 500-550 calories each.

Macros will be dictated by your personal approach. I’m running at (carbs, protein, fats) 50-25-25 on training days, and 30-35-35 on rest days. Go with what works for you. I’m not a qualified dietician and recommend that if you’re looking for diet guidance in line with heavy training, Martin Berkhan’s Leangains is my suggestion.

]]>https://dadlifts.wordpress.com/2015/11/03/training-programme-the-guest-principal/feed/2the guest principalanapestictendenciesHow I Lost over 30lbs without Losing (too much) Musclehttps://dadlifts.wordpress.com/2015/10/06/how-i-lost-over-30lbs-without-losing-too-much-muscle/
https://dadlifts.wordpress.com/2015/10/06/how-i-lost-over-30lbs-without-losing-too-much-muscle/#respondTue, 06 Oct 2015 19:24:46 +0000http://dadlifts.wordpress.com/?p=9]]>Strong headline, right? I went from over 220lbs to 191lbs over the course of 6 months. I maintained most of my big lifts (and actually set a new deadlift PB) and now look bigger than I did with the extra bulk.

Want to know the secret?

There isn’t one. No secrets here.

MyFitnessPal: the single greatest weapon in your bulking or cutting arsenal. Download it now. Really.

Everyone loves a good weight loss story. Especially those adverts you see at the bottom of articles touting the “latest fat burning pill” or “new legal steroid”. You know the ones.

And yet though we’re smart enough not to fall for the click bait headlines, part of us wonders if there is some secret to weight loss.

There isn’t.

I’ve tried to out-train a bad diet; I can’t do it.

I’ve tried to do daily cardio; I found it unsustainable and detrimental to my lifting.

You know the single change I made that had the greatest impact?

Tracking my food intake.

Everything I read pointed me towards a common denominator: weight loss (and more specifically, fat loss) comes down to one primary equation:

Calories in versus calories out

If your body takes in fewer calories than it needs, fat loss will occur.

I had no idea how many calories I needed. The bet took I found to estimate (and the keyword here is estimate) how much I needed was the IIFYM (if it fits your macros) calculator. From there I went for a 15% reduction below maintenance and monitored my progress.

Hitting my macronutrients goals and being flexible with my diet were critical in making sure I could adhere to meeting my calorie targets, but actually seeing how many calories were going in each day and over the course of a week gave me great insight and control over how what I consumed affected my body composition.

Calorie Budgeting

I worked off a weekly caloric budget rather than daily. This meant I could eat above my target one day and then dial it back over the next couple of days.

No more cheat meals. No food group was off limits. I can’t tell you how much easier this made the whole concept of eating at a caloric deficit.

The rule of thumb is that you need to decrease your calories by 3,500 over the course of a week to lose a pound of fat. Based on that, I ate approximately 500 calories below maintenance every day.

It was a blunt approach but it worked. Hindsight tells me that I went too low too quickly on my calories and didn’t spend enough time experimenting with dieting at a higher level of calorie intake.

It’s said that you should diet on as many calories as possible, as the longer you diet, the lower you’ll need to drop your daily food intake as you progres.

As your body weight decreases, so too will your maintenance level. That means that after you’ve lost a good few pounds, you’ll need to recalculate your baseline and work off that figure less 500 calories.

From the third month on, I had one day per week where I’d eat at maintenance level in order to keep my metabolism from stalling. Again I’m not 100% sure this worked but fat loss wasn’t hampered by doing this.

Low Carb, High Carb, and Sugar

I ate carbs and still lost fat.

I ate sugar and still lost fat.

I tried low carb and my training went to shit.

I found that provided I hit my protein target of 1 gram per pound of body weight, I could fill the rest of my calories for the day with any food I wanted.

I trained best on 200g-plus of carbs. Any less than that and I struggled to match my previous session intensity, which isn’t surprising given that I was in calorie deficit for the majority of the time.

I’ll write a post on sugar in a future instalment but for now, I’ll just say that telling people to avoid sugar when dieting is setting them up to fail. And that’s both stupid and sucky.

Training

Over the course of the 6 months, I trained 3 days per week on a two-week cycle.

The split was:

Week 1 (secondary exercise after each primary)

Monday – Squats & Calves with Overhead Press

Wednesday – Bench Press & Deadlift with Biceps

Friday – Squats with Triceps

Week 2 (secondary exercise after each primary)

Monday – Incline Press & DB Rows

Wednesday – Squats & Overhead Press with Calves

Friday – Bench Press & Deadlift with Biceps

The rationale was to hit each body part roughly every 5 days using compound lifts and going heavy with good form for a minimum of 5 reps on the last set. The only exception to this was deadlift where I’d test my strength and go for a 1-rep max.

As training splits go, it’s not ideal. I often dropped shoulder work in week 2 due to the amount of work they were doing as part of chest days.

I also didn’t really progress in terms of the weight I was lifting. My squat plateaued at 264lbs then decreased to 242, bench stopped at 220lbs, and deadlift topped out at 440lbs.

Although the numbers didn’t keep going up, that they didn’t drop too much meant that I held on to most of my size.

Main problem with my training is that it lacked structure and progression. I was spinning my wheels. I maintained and that was enough to get me through the caloric deficit phase.

Summary

To recap, I lost weight by:

Eating fewer calories than my body needs over a period of a week

Tracking my food intake to monitor those calories and remove any guesswork

Lifting weights three times per week

Eating a variety of foods and never feeling deprived

Not seeing my diet as a diet, but just simply as “the way I eat”

I’ll blog in more detail as I get around to it, but it’s been a revelation in finding out that fat loss isn’t as difficult as it’s made out to be.